My heart is pounding right now. A million thanks for naming this. I’ve only just realized over the last few weeks of writing that my father made my childhood home a nightmare and I’ve never felt safe living with a man since. Two divorces didn’t clue me in 🤔 Living on my own going on 13 years now. LOVE the peace of mind.
What's happening to women right now is reminiscent of the late 1940s. Coming off of World War II where women did literally everything up to and including delivering bombers to air bases, building battleships, and conducting covert espionage and sabotage operations in occupied Europe, while simultaneously still carrying the domestic workload, the government and Madison Avenue decided it was time to put women "back in their boxes". The goal was to restore men to their position of supremacy and women to theirs of dependency.
[As an aside, it wasn't much better for Black men who fought against Fascism abroad and returned to segregation at home. That's not the topic of this substack, but I wanted to make sure it was acknowledged.]
100% right! The government created a federally funded daycare system during the war so women could work easier. As per usual, the program was closed when the war ended as women were expected to go back home and give the job back to a guy coming home.
I see it coming… so many hard fought for rights being stripped away. it may seem ridiculous or impossible… but this is NOT the America it once was… yet it is also very eerily close to the America it once was… the shifting seems familiar though.. it’s happened before. We can feel these shifts in our very core.
I got married at 23 and promptly was utterly overwhelmed by the culture and trappings of my husband's enormous, loud, wealthy family. I was expected to play a very certain narrow role and never stray outside of it. Our entire home was filled with HIS stuff, HIS family antiques, HIS choice of artwork on the walls. When I got divorced at 46, I bought a tiny Craftsman bungalow that needed work but it was the very first time in my adult life I got to live in a home that was MINE, of my own making, with my own choices for furnishings, etc. I still live in that little house and I love it beyond measure. I have a new partner now, and he shares this space with me and we add touches that please BOTH of us. My two grown kids also LOVE this house because they recognize it reflects me. My tastes, my preferences, my priorities, my personality. There is nothing to compare with having a home of your OWN.
I’m 59 but as a hobby not my job I love cleaning and fixing houses . I wish someone would pay me ! Ha . So during Kamala’s run I started a little ai incubator and made a tool for women who love houses.
It goes through the construction and inspection report like a 50 year master contractor who’s your freaking dad . And then costs it out .
May I show you it ? I think it’s a tool that will help women who deal with men contractors and anyone really who wants to learn ?
I would not post on your page without permission but todays writing by you struck me hard
Let me get permission I don’t want to hurt another women and her page by hijacking the content . I think this will help us im excited to show other house junkies that this mofo tool levels the playing field . Thank you so much for wanting to see it , it means a lot to me Laura H !!! ❤️❤️
Tristen ! Hi . It’s still raw and not totally live yet but it will be everything a woman will need to steer her own deals with tits out confidence .
My little contribution to GenX feminism and all the women before me and good guys who helped us . But you can share away with the caveat that I’m not “ live” yet…. What a great note to get from you , thank you very much
I bought my house, a neglected foreclosure, 11 years ago as a single woman. It has driven me to tears more than once. I had to learn how to do most things myself because I couldn't afford to hire. I renovated my bathroom (tile, toilet, sink, and everything), gutted a mold-damaged basement, painted every surface, replaced doors and windows, installed new flooring, built a deck, landscaped... now it is filled with color and art and animals and plants and books and good food and drinks and it is my sanctuary. (It is never finished, but that is also kind of the point.) My husband now gets to live here, too, and even though we call it our house, he knows it is really mine (and it remains in my name).
Oh, I have made mistakes. :) I recently paid to have a door reinstalled that I did that was leaking. My bathroom pedestal sink installation made me cry. But I've always gone by the philosophy of "what do I have to lose if this thing is already broken/busted?" And Lyz is so right about the dads of YouTube. Most of what I have done has been thanks to either my dad or YouTube.
I have once shared my house with a live-in partner. I'm not completely opposed to doing it again, but I'm not great at making space for other people's stuff. I've spent so long here by myself the house is already full! But it would be nice to have another adult around who felt invested in the stuff I'm not great at doing by myself, like ornamental gardening and dealing with the crap that accumulates on the porches.
I married my first husband really young and never had my own closet as an adult until I left him. I loved having my own closet so much, that I refuse to share a closet now. Luckily, we have enough closets in my current house that he gets the closet in the office and I get to keep mine all for myself. Our timing worked out easily--I bought the house when we started dating and it was too big for just me, so we gradually filled it up together over the course of a few years as we got more serious. But making room for his stuff does remain an issue (he LOVES stuff).
Decades ago now, I read a journal article about a couple who got together late in life after both had lived alone for many years. To adjust and still preserve their individual needs for space/autonomy, they each claimed a floor of the house as personal space. If memory serves, one claimed the second floor and the other the finished basement. Then they shared all the common space on the first floor. They would have multiple "sleepovers" in each other's private spaces each week, but then they always set aside nights to retreat to their separate spaces.
I always loved that scenario. I think I could handle that.
I can’t help it and it probably means I’m a terrible person but your last point reminded me of a young man I knew in Texas who told me he had everything he wanted in the world as he stood proudly outside his rented single-wide prefab home and his new $60,000 special edition Ford pickup truck.
Like Iceland, America would be far better off if it was run by women.
That would be funny if it didn't have such negative consequences. No doubt there were a lot of male Trump voters who thought that was the attitude of all Democrats, and voted for that idiot because at least he didn't hate them.
I'm ten years into home ownership as a single woman and despite the stress and hassles (First winter, the basement flooded because the sump pump broke and I had to bail it out by hand. A couple of years back the roof needed to be replaced immediately. Friends started a GoFundMe to help out, I had to put more than a third on a credit card, and ask my mom for the rest. But now I have a metal roof that will last until I die.), there is nothing more satisfying to me than slowly but surely turning it into a space that both holds me and delights me.
I haven't been good at cohabitation, historically. Control over my space and safety and time are too important to me. I would prefer to have a partner who lives next door. And has enough of a sense of humor to enjoy talking through two cans and a string, or maybe walkie-talkies, so he can confirm it's okay to come over.
So much agree! I've tried living with men and they are a lot of extra expense and work with minimal reward. A close-by-but-not-in-my-actual-space partner would be perfect.
Thanks so much for this Liz. I think it would take a book or two to lay out the story of the apartments and houses I’ve landed in. My dog Blu is very much like your Dolly. He is mine and nearly jumped my five-foot fence to prove it to the last guy I had doing work here who insisted he could ‘tame’ Blu. I’ve had this now 130 year old home for about 18 years, raised four of my seven kids here after my divorce 24 years ago. Worked three jobs at once to keep it and was only able to purchase it with the help of my sister after losing the last place to a bankruptcy. I concur on all you’ve written here. Have had similar experiences with contractors asking what my husband thinks, and telling me what I should do with the house ignoring my wants and ideas ( btw, congratulations are in order here. I have finally celebrated an anniversary of my divorce that puts me a year further than my marriage! 24 years. Woot!)
After eight years of actively looking for help I finally found a handy man who has a similar eye, and welcomes my help on projects. I am learning as we go. Me and this house have been through thick and thick and I owed her the TLC she’s finally getting.
I want to share a cool bit of her history. Apparently the two lots this home sits on were won by the WIFE in a divorce settlement back in 1857, exactly 100 years before I was born. It says in the abstract that her husband , one of the developers of the town of Waverly, was accused of ‘inhumane treatment of his wife’. And she got the land my house was built on 20 years later in 1887. I am digging further into this history, but wow. Feels like I definitely belong here, for now.
Even though I only discovered/acknowledged that I'm a woman at age 50, I've always felt safer around women. A few years ago, I wrote an essay for my then therapist about my adolescence, and she said, "Wow, there were no safe men in your life except your father " I went to an all boys high school with only male teachers and I hated it.
When I came out to a close friend a few years ago, she said, "I never thought you were a straight man, so it makes sense you're trans."
Yes, it makes sense I'm a woman and the overwhelming majority of my friends and colleagues are women,and my best mentors have always been women.
What a great article! And I love that you have a large, wild looking dog. You make great points about the importance of women creating their own homes and feeling safe. I own a large historic home that we bought when my husband was alive and I have managed to keep it ever since. My experiences with contractors have been good because I'm fussy about who I hire - also it helps that I've never done any major work the way you have. I wouldn't mind having the right partner if by some miracle I found him, but it is so satisfying to have this house on my own and know that I can manage it. And I have an 86 lb rescue Pitbull
Oh ok I have one last little funny story of a contractor and a dog fiasco . I had this house in Carlsbad ca and it had a koi pond and the previous owner loved these koi and I made a commitment to care for the koi like they were my kids.
I got a rescue from the shelter during hurricane katrina . San Diego has top notch animal facilities so in a disaster they do some heavy lifting .
Anyhoo, her name was Cammy jo ( Camilla Josephine after my great grama )
She was a little spitfire who hated men and she used to plot to stalk and bite all the kids but she knew it would not be good . But she had it in her for sure.
So Mr koi pond comes over and say “ don’t go near that dog she doesn’t like men and when I’m home alone with kids if you approach me she will attack you .
I straight up warned the dude don’t freaking come near her, or try to dominate her she will eat you .
He disregarded my authority in my home with my animal and he chased her to get attention and she rapidly went to his butt took a giant bite out of his taint and he cried for an hour in my bathroom .
Lyz I just love this. As a newly divorced mom who 'got the house' I am feeling a bit overwhelmed and wresting with what my relationship to this house is going to be. One day I feel I can inhabit the whole place, the next I feel small and like this house may eat me alive. Your consistent writing is a balm.
I hope you can find a way to make it your own. And if it just becomes a question of making do until your kids are older and then you sell it to move somewhere that's only ever been yours, that's okay, too. I bought my house right after my divorce, so my ex has never been a part of it, but as I'm contemplating both my kids aging up and moving out it's feeling like a lot of house. Not sure what I'm going to do, but I might just sell and find a little place that's me-sized. Real estate doesn't have to be a noose around your neck. At least, that's what I keep telling myself.
Wow. This hit HARD. Some of my biggest fights have been with a contractor who later divorced one of my best friends. Tom insisted for a very long time that the skylight he'd installed in my kitchen in 2000-2001 DID NOT LEAK. I asked my husband to deal with Tom, that went nowhere.
Finally I called Tom during a thunderstorm and said as calmly as I could, get your ass over to my house NOW and tell me this mother wanking skylight is not leaking all over my fucking kitchen. He did. He replaced it and said quietly, that is the first time I've had to replace a skylight.
He did not bill me for labor, just parts. He did not like me one bit and I could care less. Now he lives in the northern suburbs of Minneapolis with his second wife. Good riddance.
This is an excellent take on my life! I just need to train my dogs to be less friendly. As a single woman and fourth time home-owner (one was w/a husband), I FEEL this!! Ive had so many contractors try to take advantage of me financially- a few have been successful but damn, I’m learning. I love fixing up and remodeling this old house. The satisfaction is good, but also knowing I can do mostly whatever those stupid contractors can do is so empowering. I do feel safe and secure within these walls, it is my peaceful kingdom!
My heart is pounding right now. A million thanks for naming this. I’ve only just realized over the last few weeks of writing that my father made my childhood home a nightmare and I’ve never felt safe living with a man since. Two divorces didn’t clue me in 🤔 Living on my own going on 13 years now. LOVE the peace of mind.
What's happening to women right now is reminiscent of the late 1940s. Coming off of World War II where women did literally everything up to and including delivering bombers to air bases, building battleships, and conducting covert espionage and sabotage operations in occupied Europe, while simultaneously still carrying the domestic workload, the government and Madison Avenue decided it was time to put women "back in their boxes". The goal was to restore men to their position of supremacy and women to theirs of dependency.
[As an aside, it wasn't much better for Black men who fought against Fascism abroad and returned to segregation at home. That's not the topic of this substack, but I wanted to make sure it was acknowledged.]
If you haven't, highly recommend Homeward Bound by Elaine Tyler May that has a great examination of this exact era
100% right! The government created a federally funded daycare system during the war so women could work easier. As per usual, the program was closed when the war ended as women were expected to go back home and give the job back to a guy coming home.
I see it coming… so many hard fought for rights being stripped away. it may seem ridiculous or impossible… but this is NOT the America it once was… yet it is also very eerily close to the America it once was… the shifting seems familiar though.. it’s happened before. We can feel these shifts in our very core.
I got married at 23 and promptly was utterly overwhelmed by the culture and trappings of my husband's enormous, loud, wealthy family. I was expected to play a very certain narrow role and never stray outside of it. Our entire home was filled with HIS stuff, HIS family antiques, HIS choice of artwork on the walls. When I got divorced at 46, I bought a tiny Craftsman bungalow that needed work but it was the very first time in my adult life I got to live in a home that was MINE, of my own making, with my own choices for furnishings, etc. I still live in that little house and I love it beyond measure. I have a new partner now, and he shares this space with me and we add touches that please BOTH of us. My two grown kids also LOVE this house because they recognize it reflects me. My tastes, my preferences, my priorities, my personality. There is nothing to compare with having a home of your OWN.
So I’m a house person junkie Extrodinaire .
I’m 59 but as a hobby not my job I love cleaning and fixing houses . I wish someone would pay me ! Ha . So during Kamala’s run I started a little ai incubator and made a tool for women who love houses.
It goes through the construction and inspection report like a 50 year master contractor who’s your freaking dad . And then costs it out .
May I show you it ? I think it’s a tool that will help women who deal with men contractors and anyone really who wants to learn ?
I would not post on your page without permission but todays writing by you struck me hard
Thank you
Let me get permission I don’t want to hurt another women and her page by hijacking the content . I think this will help us im excited to show other house junkies that this mofo tool levels the playing field . Thank you so much for wanting to see it , it means a lot to me Laura H !!! ❤️❤️
I’d love to see it :)
Valproperty.ai
Yes, please!
Valproperty.ai
OMG! This is amazing! Yes! You rock. Thank you. Do you mind if I share it?
Tristen ! Hi . It’s still raw and not totally live yet but it will be everything a woman will need to steer her own deals with tits out confidence .
My little contribution to GenX feminism and all the women before me and good guys who helped us . But you can share away with the caveat that I’m not “ live” yet…. What a great note to get from you , thank you very much
Okey doke-I will let people know! Also, I love the “tits out” comment! Reminds me of Mrs. Maisel’s “Tits up!”😁
Yes, I love that we will credit her and whoever I’m sure it’s not popular but it’s true . And I get severe side eye when I say it in meetings
Tits up
I bought my house, a neglected foreclosure, 11 years ago as a single woman. It has driven me to tears more than once. I had to learn how to do most things myself because I couldn't afford to hire. I renovated my bathroom (tile, toilet, sink, and everything), gutted a mold-damaged basement, painted every surface, replaced doors and windows, installed new flooring, built a deck, landscaped... now it is filled with color and art and animals and plants and books and good food and drinks and it is my sanctuary. (It is never finished, but that is also kind of the point.) My husband now gets to live here, too, and even though we call it our house, he knows it is really mine (and it remains in my name).
Love this. I am in awe that you replaced windows... that seems like an especially daunting job. Building a deck too!! Yes!
Oh, I have made mistakes. :) I recently paid to have a door reinstalled that I did that was leaking. My bathroom pedestal sink installation made me cry. But I've always gone by the philosophy of "what do I have to lose if this thing is already broken/busted?" And Lyz is so right about the dads of YouTube. Most of what I have done has been thanks to either my dad or YouTube.
I have once shared my house with a live-in partner. I'm not completely opposed to doing it again, but I'm not great at making space for other people's stuff. I've spent so long here by myself the house is already full! But it would be nice to have another adult around who felt invested in the stuff I'm not great at doing by myself, like ornamental gardening and dealing with the crap that accumulates on the porches.
I married my first husband really young and never had my own closet as an adult until I left him. I loved having my own closet so much, that I refuse to share a closet now. Luckily, we have enough closets in my current house that he gets the closet in the office and I get to keep mine all for myself. Our timing worked out easily--I bought the house when we started dating and it was too big for just me, so we gradually filled it up together over the course of a few years as we got more serious. But making room for his stuff does remain an issue (he LOVES stuff).
Decades ago now, I read a journal article about a couple who got together late in life after both had lived alone for many years. To adjust and still preserve their individual needs for space/autonomy, they each claimed a floor of the house as personal space. If memory serves, one claimed the second floor and the other the finished basement. Then they shared all the common space on the first floor. They would have multiple "sleepovers" in each other's private spaces each week, but then they always set aside nights to retreat to their separate spaces.
I always loved that scenario. I think I could handle that.
I can’t help it and it probably means I’m a terrible person but your last point reminded me of a young man I knew in Texas who told me he had everything he wanted in the world as he stood proudly outside his rented single-wide prefab home and his new $60,000 special edition Ford pickup truck.
Like Iceland, America would be far better off if it was run by women.
Kristi Noem, Marcia Blackburn, Marjorie Taylor-Green......no.
Not all men are assholes. Not all women are saints. But, as a man, I agree with you that women are more likely to govern in the interests of all.
Actually, all men r assholes. It’s male nature.
That would be funny if it didn't have such negative consequences. No doubt there were a lot of male Trump voters who thought that was the attitude of all Democrats, and voted for that idiot because at least he didn't hate them.
Yes, it's definitely Democrats' fault Trump got elected. Not that people were attracted to Trump's message. <sarcasm>
I guess it's ok to say, "all men r assholes" on a feminist Substack. Got it.
I'm ten years into home ownership as a single woman and despite the stress and hassles (First winter, the basement flooded because the sump pump broke and I had to bail it out by hand. A couple of years back the roof needed to be replaced immediately. Friends started a GoFundMe to help out, I had to put more than a third on a credit card, and ask my mom for the rest. But now I have a metal roof that will last until I die.), there is nothing more satisfying to me than slowly but surely turning it into a space that both holds me and delights me.
I haven't been good at cohabitation, historically. Control over my space and safety and time are too important to me. I would prefer to have a partner who lives next door. And has enough of a sense of humor to enjoy talking through two cans and a string, or maybe walkie-talkies, so he can confirm it's okay to come over.
So much agree! I've tried living with men and they are a lot of extra expense and work with minimal reward. A close-by-but-not-in-my-actual-space partner would be perfect.
Thanks so much for this Liz. I think it would take a book or two to lay out the story of the apartments and houses I’ve landed in. My dog Blu is very much like your Dolly. He is mine and nearly jumped my five-foot fence to prove it to the last guy I had doing work here who insisted he could ‘tame’ Blu. I’ve had this now 130 year old home for about 18 years, raised four of my seven kids here after my divorce 24 years ago. Worked three jobs at once to keep it and was only able to purchase it with the help of my sister after losing the last place to a bankruptcy. I concur on all you’ve written here. Have had similar experiences with contractors asking what my husband thinks, and telling me what I should do with the house ignoring my wants and ideas ( btw, congratulations are in order here. I have finally celebrated an anniversary of my divorce that puts me a year further than my marriage! 24 years. Woot!)
After eight years of actively looking for help I finally found a handy man who has a similar eye, and welcomes my help on projects. I am learning as we go. Me and this house have been through thick and thick and I owed her the TLC she’s finally getting.
I want to share a cool bit of her history. Apparently the two lots this home sits on were won by the WIFE in a divorce settlement back in 1857, exactly 100 years before I was born. It says in the abstract that her husband , one of the developers of the town of Waverly, was accused of ‘inhumane treatment of his wife’. And she got the land my house was built on 20 years later in 1887. I am digging further into this history, but wow. Feels like I definitely belong here, for now.
Even though I only discovered/acknowledged that I'm a woman at age 50, I've always felt safer around women. A few years ago, I wrote an essay for my then therapist about my adolescence, and she said, "Wow, there were no safe men in your life except your father " I went to an all boys high school with only male teachers and I hated it.
When I came out to a close friend a few years ago, she said, "I never thought you were a straight man, so it makes sense you're trans."
Yes, it makes sense I'm a woman and the overwhelming majority of my friends and colleagues are women,and my best mentors have always been women.
Also I have a Malinois
I tell the guys
Don’t come directly at me or she will give you a warning
And if she crouches down
I’d watch yourself she is saying she will attack
^^^Poetry!
What a great article! And I love that you have a large, wild looking dog. You make great points about the importance of women creating their own homes and feeling safe. I own a large historic home that we bought when my husband was alive and I have managed to keep it ever since. My experiences with contractors have been good because I'm fussy about who I hire - also it helps that I've never done any major work the way you have. I wouldn't mind having the right partner if by some miracle I found him, but it is so satisfying to have this house on my own and know that I can manage it. And I have an 86 lb rescue Pitbull
"I have a low growl in my throat at all times."
Wow. Such a spot-on line.
Oh ok I have one last little funny story of a contractor and a dog fiasco . I had this house in Carlsbad ca and it had a koi pond and the previous owner loved these koi and I made a commitment to care for the koi like they were my kids.
I got a rescue from the shelter during hurricane katrina . San Diego has top notch animal facilities so in a disaster they do some heavy lifting .
Anyhoo, her name was Cammy jo ( Camilla Josephine after my great grama )
She was a little spitfire who hated men and she used to plot to stalk and bite all the kids but she knew it would not be good . But she had it in her for sure.
So Mr koi pond comes over and say “ don’t go near that dog she doesn’t like men and when I’m home alone with kids if you approach me she will attack you .
I straight up warned the dude don’t freaking come near her, or try to dominate her she will eat you .
He disregarded my authority in my home with my animal and he chased her to get attention and she rapidly went to his butt took a giant bite out of his taint and he cried for an hour in my bathroom .
Just some fun feminism dog bites asshole story
Lyz I just love this. As a newly divorced mom who 'got the house' I am feeling a bit overwhelmed and wresting with what my relationship to this house is going to be. One day I feel I can inhabit the whole place, the next I feel small and like this house may eat me alive. Your consistent writing is a balm.
I hope you can find a way to make it your own. And if it just becomes a question of making do until your kids are older and then you sell it to move somewhere that's only ever been yours, that's okay, too. I bought my house right after my divorce, so my ex has never been a part of it, but as I'm contemplating both my kids aging up and moving out it's feeling like a lot of house. Not sure what I'm going to do, but I might just sell and find a little place that's me-sized. Real estate doesn't have to be a noose around your neck. At least, that's what I keep telling myself.
God dammmit woman, stop peeking in my journal.
Wow. This hit HARD. Some of my biggest fights have been with a contractor who later divorced one of my best friends. Tom insisted for a very long time that the skylight he'd installed in my kitchen in 2000-2001 DID NOT LEAK. I asked my husband to deal with Tom, that went nowhere.
Finally I called Tom during a thunderstorm and said as calmly as I could, get your ass over to my house NOW and tell me this mother wanking skylight is not leaking all over my fucking kitchen. He did. He replaced it and said quietly, that is the first time I've had to replace a skylight.
He did not bill me for labor, just parts. He did not like me one bit and I could care less. Now he lives in the northern suburbs of Minneapolis with his second wife. Good riddance.
This is an excellent take on my life! I just need to train my dogs to be less friendly. As a single woman and fourth time home-owner (one was w/a husband), I FEEL this!! Ive had so many contractors try to take advantage of me financially- a few have been successful but damn, I’m learning. I love fixing up and remodeling this old house. The satisfaction is good, but also knowing I can do mostly whatever those stupid contractors can do is so empowering. I do feel safe and secure within these walls, it is my peaceful kingdom!